Jay Lynn Gomez
Jay Lynn Gomez
Safety Blanket, 2025
acrylic and collage on canvas
6 x 6 ins.
15.3 x 15.3 cm
Charlie James Gallery presents an exhibition of paintings and mixed-media installations that locate Gomez’s artistic practice within the context of her transition. The exhibition asks: what does it mean to exist in this new identity, instead of constantly striving to realize it? Through a series of dreamlike paintings, Gomez makes clear that community and self-acceptance are central. Butterfly Dream documents the people and places that make up the community of trans women Gomez has found in Los Angeles, all captured in her signature documentary style. The exhibition also tackles the concerns of the artist’s past work, including issues of labor and immigration, now through a trans lens. Butterfly Dream is the artist’s fifth show with the gallery, and her first exhibition post-transition mounted in Los Angeles.
Central to the exhibition is the story of the butterfly dream, a Chinese fable originally told in an ancient Taoist text. In the story, Zhuangzi dreams he is a butterfly happy flitting about with no knowledge of his human self. Upon waking, he recalls his dream and wonders whether he is in fact a human who had dreamt of being a butterfly, or a butterfly dreaming of being Zhuangzi. Gomez evokes the butterfly dream by constantly questioning the boundaries between dream and reality, using vibrant pinks and purples to signify dreamlike spaces and images of butterflies as a symbol of transformation and freedom.
Jay Lynn Gomez
Perreando (Wilshire), 2025
acrylic collage, cardboard, spray paint on canvas
20 x 20 ins.
50.8 x 50.8 cm
Butterfly Dream captures the community of trans women Gomez has found in Los Angeles. Many of the paintings on view depict one of three anchors of this community: the TransLatin@ Coalition, the Trans Wellness Center, and the communal home for trans women where the artist resided for a time. Working from the constant stream of photographs that smartphones make possible, Gomez finds small moments of beauty and peace within a world that can often be chaotic and ugly. In her paintings, trans women laugh and dance, primp and smile and strut. They come together to receive care and build community. She has not fully left behind her past work, however: one piece captures staff vacuuming a hallway of the Trans Wellness Center, while another sees two men changing out signage in the LA Metro. These works hearken back to Gomez’s past paintings foregrounding the labor and laborers who often go unseen and unappreciated, but locates that conversation inside of a new setting.
Jay Lynn Gomez was born in 1986 in San Bernardino, CA to undocumented Mexican immigrant parents who have since become US citizens. Gomez has been the subject of solo exhibitions at the University of Michigan, Institute for the Humanities, Ann Arbor, MI; Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles, CA; and the West Hollywood Public Library, West Hollywood, CA as part of Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA. Her work has been included in group exhibitions at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY; Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, Washington, DC; Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX; Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, TX; Institute of Contemporary Art Boston, MA; Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art at Portland State University, Portland, OR; and Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University, Stanford, CA; among others. Her work is in the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA; Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, DC; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX; Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego, CA; Crocker Art Museum, Sacramento, CA; and Museum of Latin American Art, Long Beach, CA; among others. In 2016, was the subject of Domestic Scenes – The Art of Ramiro Gomez, a monograph by Lawrence Weschler, published by Abrams.
Jay Lynn Gomez
The Stories We've Lived, 2025
acrylic and collage on canvas
16 x 16 ins.
40.6 x 40.6 cm
Jay Lynn Gomez
Portrait of Marcela, 2025
acrylic on canvas
16 x 16 ins.
40.6 x 40.6 cm
Jay Lynn Gomez
My Parents and I, 2025
acrylic on canvas
16 x 16 ins.
40.6 x 40.6 cm
Jay Lynn Gomez
Trans Wellness Center, 2025
acrylic on canvas
36 x 24 ins.
91.5 x 70 cm
Jay Lynn Gomez
The Flower Seller (Wilshire), 2025
acrylic on cardboard
48 x 95 ins.
122 x 241.3 cm
Jay Lynn Gomez
Donde Esta El Perreo?, 2025
acrylic and collage on canvas
36 x 24 ins.
91.5 x 70 cm
Butterfly Dream (Installation View) Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, April 19 – May 31, 2025. Photo: Yubo Dong
Butterfly Dream (Installation View) Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, April 19 – May 31, 2025. Photo: Yubo Dong
Butterfly Dream (Installation View) Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, April 19 – May 31, 2025. Photo: Yubo Dong
Butterfly Dream (Installation View) Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, April 19 – May 31, 2025. Photo: Yubo Dong
Butterfly Dream (Installation View) Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, April 19 – May 31, 2025. Photo: Yubo Dong
Butterfly Dream (Installation View) Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, April 19 – May 31, 2025. Photo: Yubo Dong.
Butterfly Dream (Installation View) Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, April 19 – May 31, 2025. Photo: Yubo Dong
Butterfly Dream (Installation View) Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, April 19 – May 31, 2025. Photo: Yubo Dong
Butterfly Dream (Installation View) Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, April 19 – May 31, 2025. Photo: Yubo Dong
Butterfly Dream (Installation View) Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, April 19 – May 31, 2025. Photo: Yubo Dong